Industrial policy has been a frequent subject on Smith's blog, for those who don't follow it. (He's for it, and thinks that Biden's industrial policy was mostly good - it's worth following the links in this post.) This post focuses on defense-related geopolitical industrial policy goals and pros and cons of anticipated changes under the incoming Trump administration and Chinese responses. Particularly, he highlights two major things China can do: Restrict exports of raw materials (recently announced) and use their own industrial policy to hamper the West's peacetime industrial policy (de facto policy of the last 30 years). These are not extraordinary insights, but it's a good primer on the current state of affairs and policies to pay attention to in the near-future.
Noah Smith: Manufacturing is a war now
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Why don’t we just let China have Taiwan and the South China Sea? I really don’t care about China. China doesn’t care about most of the rest of the world. China doesn’t seek dominion over European civilization. China is uninterested in the export of world revolution in the way that, say, some historic communist states were. The Taiwanese will do just fine under Chinese rule; even the old KMT vets are unlikely to face any retribution in their very, very old age. Most people neither require nor care about democracy; they want streets that are safe, low crime, affordable and decent food on the table, a youth that is disciplined and hardworking, and a feeling that their country is headed in the right direction.
What matters is civilization. What matters is mass immigration. What matters is law and order. What matters is the cultural rot that has hollowed out the West, leaving a small class of feckless, neurotic elites and a vast population of normal people held hostage by the scum at the bottom of society who continuously go un- and under-punished. What matters is ugliness, in architecture, in obesity, in fonts, in advertising, in fashion. China is responsible for relatively little of this.
Challenging China is both pointless and cruel. The Chinese, for all the great flaws of their system, still have the kind of state capacity and self-belief that Western nations can only dream of. Waging a war against China would be an act of nightmarish self-harm. Fix the West, first, on a cultural level, then worry about whatever the fuck is going to happen with Taiwan (I don’t care).
Neither does the U.S., and yet we continue to keep it aligned. Cooperative. The legacy of WWII was that you don’t have to literally occupy a territory to get value from it. Set up the right rules, and the subsequent international order serves your interests.
China would prefer a different set of rules. That’s why they’re reclaiming SCS islands, pushing the rules on international waters, and making passes at Taiwan, eroding the (admittedly weak!) rules about self-determination. The SCS connects major U.S. allies to the rest of the world. Handing those routes over to Chinese control would seriously damage the current order.
I do not believe this can be done while abandoning the world stage. Hand-wringing over whether we’re worthy of dominating the planet is quintessential slave morality. Extending it down to surrendering our own borders and our own cities—isn’t that the source of most of your complaints?
I think that’s a difference of opportunity rather than one of character. Say what you will about modern Chinese urbanism; I draw the line at whitewashing the Cultural Revolution.
Well…yes. I desperately hope it doesn’t come to this. If the CCP is rational, they hope it won’t, too. We can make it out of this without any nightmares.
If anything, I’m an American imperialist. I think America should directly rule the majority of the world, especially Central and South America, Western Europe and probably Japan and Korea. I just don’t care about China. The Chinese have no great imperialist instinct the way the Japanese, Russians, Anglos and French have or have had. They don’t seek to rule me or convert me to the Chinese system and never have. Theirs is not - in a deep sense, deeper than surface level marxism - an imperial civilization with global aims.
Throughout most of it's history China had a tributary empire, regarding itself as the centre of civilisation (hence the 'Middle/Central Kingdom'). Neighbouring states were generally forced to adopt Chinese customs and pay tribute (with those that didn't being considered barbarians). It also expanded considerably over the centuries.
It wasn't colonial in the same way as Western European powers were and didn't have overseas territorial expansion or settler colonies (presumably largely due to China having such extensive land borders and territory to expand into), but it was definitely imperialistic.
One might argue that imperial Chinese history has little to no bearing on the posture of the modern Chinese state. As I understand we don't have good insight into the internal dynamics and political factions within the CCP, so it's difficult to talk definitively, but I do think it's pertinent that:
In terms of foreign relations policy the argument is more mixed. Certainly the CCP's stated foreign relations principles generally emphasise territorial respect, non-aggression and non-interference, and as I understand it the CCP does generally vote in accordance with these at the UN. However:
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